Dragonslayer wrote on 09/19/11 at 14:51:43:


Yes true

About c3 sicilian and Morra gambit transposing, I had the impression that  2 .. Nf6 was mainline in Alapin sicilian. Several black repertour books against c3 sicilian recommends d5 instead to get more life in the position but thats an other story. Mainline in Morra starts with taking the pawn but if a game transposes to c3 sicilian via a Morra order I would not disagree if it gets inserted into a Morra database . The Morra move order has also an advantage that declined with d5 instead is less strong than c3 sicilian with d5. 

The categorisation comes from the fact that the position is more often reached via a 2 c3 move order than a Morra move order. 

About Morra, it is even possible to transpose to French by playing meeting c3 via e6 cxd4 d5 even thorught an early exchange of c pawns are possible in whites favor. I surprised an opponnet with about the same rating with e6 a won a nice game in 1999 but I have not repeated it since.

There are more funny categorications in chess openings with a similar theme.
After for example 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 e6 3 Nf3 Bb4+ it is a Bogo indian. But after 4 Nc3 we have a Nimzo Indian and after the reply b6 we have a Queens Indian.

Michel Barbaut wrote on 09/17/11 at 11:53:53:

Eehh, yes. I really don't care if you continue to call that beloved gambit Morra-Smith Gambit.
But I do care about facts. After ...dxc3 Matulovic scored a whopping 89% according to my database out of 9 games. His only loss was against Kotov, which is not really something to be ashamed of. Matulovic won with it in at least one important tournament:



Matulovic,M - Bradvarevic,A [B21]
JUGch Sombor (7), 1957



What's more, the combination with 13.Nd5 is theoretically significant until today.
I don't think the Morra Gambit has very often been played on a higher level with success.

@Michel Barbaut.
Sorry but MNb is right on this one. Offering the gambit is clearly the objective criterion otherwise you might say I never played e.g. The King's gambit if all my games went 1.e4 e5 2.f4 Nc6 3.Nc3 which is the Vienna.
Which is rather silly.

Yes Jonassson and Schackbulletinen förlag is indeed swedish.

Basman book and common language in Sweden however only calls it Morra Gambit.

Interesting thread, interesting to learn who Morra actually was. In Sweden the gambit is only called "Morra Gambit" and not "Smith-Morra". 

In the good old days when I played this gambit with both sides and decided to be more serios than just reading a Swedish translated version of Mike Basmans "Chess Openings" that had a good Morra introduction chapter and searched for theory books I came up with the name "Smith-Morra" from the book "Winning with the Smith-Morra Gambit" (as I recall it was a good book). 

However a few years later I later switched to open sicilian instead but thats an other story.

@ Djy
Thanks for the games, some interesting ones !!

@MNb
Are all the 21 games about the accepted variation ? I have some too by Matulovic and most of them transpose to the 2.c3 Sicilian (after ...Nf6 -the most played- and ...d5)
If you really believe that playing about 20 games justified to attach a name to an opening ... so what about a man who played more than one hundred games with it ? Unfortunately, most of the games by Smith were not recorded 
In the Megadatabase 2011, there are 2071 recorded games by GM Matulovic, 1073 with white among which  988 are classified from B00 to C99 and so only no more than 56 games for everything else, so I really believe that he lost faith with the gambit ! And I hope to find where I read this too,from an old revue but I can't remember now exactly which one.

@ Phil
Why do I believe this gambit to be correct ?
There are several reasons ...
1) Actually, there is no refutation of the gambit
2) Most GMs (or books if you prefer, write for the black side ) don't accept the pawn on c3 and transpose to a 2.c3 sicilian !!!!
3) Most of the rest take the challenge on c3 but add something like this "this gambit is dangerous and should be taken seriously" Just check books (or video) by Gufeld, Browne and the latest QC book by Ftacnik

I really like the following :

- In 1994, during the French championship in Chambéry, the G.M Anatoly Vaisser was given a simul. And when it was ended, we discussed with the G.M, I took advantage of it to ask him what he thought about  the gambit Morra (that he had massacred on one of the chessboards near to me me). His answer (add the Russian accent) demonstrate very well what strong players think of this gambit:

- M.B : «  What do you think about the Smith-Morra gambit ? »
- A.V : «  … the Morra gambit … black takes the pawn  … and, at least, has a draw »
- M.B : « Which variation do you play against it ? »
- A.V : « ..I … I don’t take the pawn ... I play 3…Nf6 » (!!!)

Nice answer, isn't it ?

To be continued